[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 158 (2012), Part 9]
[Extensions of Remarks]
[Page 12544]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




  HOUSE ARMED SERVICES COMMITTEE AND HOUSE VETERANS AFFAIRS COMMITTEE 
                             JOINT HEARING

                                 ______
                                 

                            HON. RICK LARSEN

                             of washington

                    in the house of representatives

                        Thursday, July 26, 2012

  Mr. LARSEN of Washington. Mr. Speaker, I submit the following. Thank 
you, Mr. Chairman, and welcome to Secretary Panetta and Secretary 
Shinseki.
  More than 2 million American women and men are returning home from 
more than a decade of war in Iraq and Afghanistan.
  Many are returning scarred, with lost limbs, brain injuries or mental 
illness. Too many are coming back to unemployment lines. And too many 
are struggling to keep their homes.
  To address these problems, Congress and the administration have 
worked together to support veterans' needs through efforts like 
building more Department of Veterans Affairs community based outpatient 
clinics, like the one in Mount Vernon, Washington state. The VA, the 
Department of Defense, and National Institutes of Health are conducting 
state-of-the-art brain research to understand and find better 
treatments for traumatic brain injury and post-traumatic stress 
disorder. And the VA and DoD are working together to provide more 
timely disability claims processing.
  The passage of the Vow To Hire Heroes Act and the 21st Century GI 
Bill were important steps to help veterans translate their skills to 
civilian jobs. These programs provide career advice for transitioning 
servicemembers through the Transition Assistance Program and help 
veterans go back to school.
  And we are supporting veterans housing through the Department of 
Housing and Urban Development Veterans Affairs Supportive Housing 
Program (HUD-VASH) program, which provides affordable housing vouchers 
and social services like case management. 100 homeless veterans in 
Skagit and Snohomish Counties have received HUD-VASH vouchers so far 
this year. Part of ending homelessness among veterans is prevention, 
and for that, VA and DoD recently began legal assistance programs to 
provide relief for veterans and servicemembers who were hurt by 
mortgage abuses and assist those seeking to refinance.
  Still, there is more that we have to do, and I encourage all of us in 
this room to think of what we can do to help these veterans.
  For example, in my district, we are reaching out to veterans, 
employers and educators to help veterans translate the skills they 
developed in the military to meet private sector needs, and help 
employers and educators understand the value of veterans' military 
training.
  I look forward to hearing more about what the DoD and VA are doing to 
support veterans transitioning back to civilian life. With hard work 
and support from the government and local communities, these veterans 
coming home from Iraq and Afghanistan can have a smooth transition back 
to civilian life, and our older veterans can get the support they 
deserve.

                          ____________________